{"id":36871,"date":"2018-02-12T16:10:02","date_gmt":"2018-02-12T21:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/?p=36871"},"modified":"2018-02-12T16:17:41","modified_gmt":"2018-02-12T21:17:41","slug":"brunk-impersonation-brings-to-life-menno-simons-and-his-soul-struggle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2018\/brunk-impersonation-brings-to-life-menno-simons-and-his-soul-struggle\/","title":{"rendered":"Impersonation brings to life Menno Simons and his \u2018soul struggle\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

If the Catholic-priest-turned-Anabaptist-radical Menno Simons were on a speaking tour, you\u2019d expect him to make a stop at his namesake university. But he died in 1561, and so when Simons showed up last week at 91短视频, he looked an awful lot like Gerald Brunk.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Gerald Brunk stands by a portrait of Menno Simons. (Photo by Mia Kivlighan)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Brunk, who taught in the 91短视频 history department for 36 years and before last week had already presented his impersonation of Simons 96 times, performed \u201cMy Road to Decision\u201d in a Feb. 8 seminary chapel service. It\u2019s a bringing-to-life of the writings of Simons focused on the 11 years that culminated in his becoming an Anabaptist.<\/span><\/p>\n

Brunk said that his years of impersonating Simons has had a \u201ctremendous impact\u201d on him.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt has enabled me not only to understand Menno, but to try to get some feel of what kind of struggle he went through, and what kind of revelations he had,\u201d he said: \u201cThe courage, the tremendous courage the man had, in him going out as a fugitive and preaching the word.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A priest\u2019s \u2018soul struggle\u2019<\/b><\/h3>\n

Dressed in black robes and cap and wearing a silver cross around his neck, Brunk embodied the \u201csoul struggle\u201d that Simons faced beginning in 1525. <\/span><\/p>\n

Over the next 11 years, as he came to embrace nonviolence and the \u201cheresy\u201d of Anabaptism, Simons began to read the Bible \u2013 something that in all his monastic years he\u2019d never before done. <\/span><\/p>\n